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User blog:Vance Clark/Memories of a Life Now Gone
March 02nd-03rd, 2017. Nightfall came, and the apartment Vance was staying in was dimly lit, just enough that one could see what they were doing in there. This was a change from the usual, since Vance preferred to sleep at night, keeping all light and sounds in the apartment non-existent during the hours that zombies were out in greatest number. But Vance was eager to go out zombie-hunting, and he had plans to locate that lab he read about early in the morning. He always kept his H&K USP and Combat Knife holster on either side of him, and he slung his new AK5 behind his back. Since his handgun was out of ammo, one of his goals and hopes tonight would be to raid any gun store he could find in hopes of looting some ammo, and after that he would try and steal into the aforementioned lab. Vance equipped his USP with all the attachments he could fit so he wouldn’t have to waste time later; A sound suppressor at the end of the barrel, an LED flashlight underneath the barrel, and a short-range high-precision scope on the top of the barrel. The rest of the attachments he put in his jacket pocket for now. Heading out into the city, Vance moved quietly through the streets. Heading south west through Richwood he found a small shop; deep on the inside, but not very wide. Stepping in through a broken door he saw glass counters shattered with various knives and handguns. Some assault rifles hung on the wall behind the counter, and there were ammo boxes on the ledge against the wall. Vance stood at the counter looking around for some 9mm ammo. He jumped over the shattered counter and opened a few boxes. Most boxes were empty - unlucky Vance. Looking above him at the guns on the wall, most were in disrepair, with either missing parts or parts that were soiled from overuse. There were some that looked like they were good enough to be used, but needed cleaning. Besides, carrying around a full armament won’t do him any good. All he needs is ammo for the guns he has and he’ll be fine. Finally finding a box of 9mms that wasn’t empty, and in fact was quite full with maybe a few bullets here and there having been removed, he stashes the box in his pocket... Suddenly he hears a noise of broken glass being stepped on to his right! Quickly drawing out his handgun, even though its clip is empty, Vance switches on the flashlight and aims it into the darkness. He sees a human, female, wearing leather that accentuated her figure. She had long reddish-brown hair that curled over her shoulders and down her back, and noticeably had gun straps worn on her chest. Four pouches hung down at the base of the straps, just below her breasts, and under each arm she had a Steyr TMP, each with a clip that extended a good two inches past the bottom of the hand-grips. Attached to her belt hung a single M4S stock attachment, and there was definitely an SMG on her back, probably an M4 that goes with that stock. Definitely being better prepared for combat than Vance at the moment, she looked pretty tough, not to mention attractive. Although Vance wasn’t distracted by her appearance, he was a little surprised to see this woman, and had a feeling of uneasiness that he couldn’t explain. He chalked it up to her being a stranger and better armed than him, so potentially a threat he wouldn’t be able to beat, but so far she hasn’t been hostile, and if she sought to kill him, she could have done it already. Vance was about to ask ‘who are you?’, but before he even opened his mouth, she ran right up to him and somewhat jumped, wrapping her arms around his neck, and even had one of her legs raised behind her. “Vance! Oh, I’m so glad to see you! I thought... I was told you were dead. I should have known you were too good to die like that!” As it appeared she could have been about to kiss him on the cheek, and since Vance didn’t know her... at least not that he’s aware of, he placed his arms on her shoulders and held her at arm’s length. She looked at him with bewilderment in her eyes and tilted her head a bit. “What’s wrong?” she asked, as if not expecting him to hold her away like that. “I don’t know who you are.. or how you know my name. I’m sorry if you know me, or if we knew each other in the past.. but I don’t remember you.” She looked a little upset, but took that look off her face rather quickly, and calmly spoke. “I’d heard you’d had some.. accident. Some sort of trauma to your head. So I guess it makes sense you don’t remember me.” She steps back and looks him over. “Well at least you appear to be well. Could be better dressed; this is not like you, Vance. To be honest I had to step closer to know for certain it was you. But it was always your eyes that defined you.” “Now hold on a moment, and answer me this... What exactly.. was the nature of our...” “Relationship?” “Yeah...” The woman laughed loud, but quietened herself, obviously aware of the danger of making a lot of noise, especially at this hour. “If you think I’m attractive enough to have been your girlfriend, then.. well you’ve got another thing coming.” She grins deviously for a moment, probably thinking of the possibility to use his ‘disadvantage’ to get somewhere with him. She did find him sexy pretty much the entire year they’d known each other, but their business was more important than personal affairs. “We were partners. Not together like that, but business partners. And I’d like to think we were pretty good friends. I knew you for a several months, and you seemed hallow somehow... Back then you didn’t really talk to anyone unless it was about the work we were doing, and you never let me inside your heart. You were a hard one to read, but after a while you started to open up to me a bit. Made you seem more human.. and ever since then I was a lot happier working with you. You made the job seem a lot less cold and empty.. for a time.” Vance stood quietly, trying to make sense of all she’d said so far. What kind of work did they do? He needed to know more. He nodded his head and said “Ok... keep talking.” “Well..” She continued, “We didn’t always work directly together but whatever task we had to do we were always somehow in on it together. And one day.. when the accident happened that lead us to believe you were dead..” She stopped a moment, making it look like what she’s talking about had caused her some pain in the past. “Your body was left there. I wanted to go retrieve your body. I thought it was sick to just leave you there. You.. you mattered more to me than the others we worked with. Sure, at first you were the one person who stuck out as the most cold and even merciless. You seemed to have no heart at all. But in the end you were more human than anyone else. The change in you is what made me want to go get you. No matter what life we live, anyone who shows compassion and true humanity within their last moments deserves a proper burial. I think you deserved enough respect to at least have been treated as more than...” She stopped, as if looking for the right words. “More than what?” Vance asked. “More than just a replaceable tool.” She replied and cringed a bit, as if it hurt her a little to say it. Silence evaded the room for a few minutes. Vance didn’t know what to say, having not remembered any of that which she has told him, and the woman, who’s still yet to give him her name, seemed lost for words in an almost emotional way. Vance finally broke the silence. “The past is the past. While I don’t remember it, and trust me I wish I did, it doesn’t change that I’m alive now. It doesn’t change who I am.” “Or who you’ve become.” She replied. Vance thought about this a moment, uncertain if she meant that in a good way or a bad way. He spoke again, “Anyways, we can talk more about the past later. What I want to know right now is...” He paused a moment. “Actually I could certainly use a name.” She looked confused and asked, “A name?” to which Vance replied, “Your name. You haven’t told me it yet.. at least, haven’t reminded me of it.” She laughed lightly and held out her hand. “My name is Cassandra DeViera. But I’ve always preferred it when you started calling me Cass.” Vance shook her hand, noting the feel of her grip. It was strong and controlled, yet soft and smooth. “Alright Cass. I came here looking for some ammo, and I’m currently investigating something related to the strange things that have been going on in this city. Some kind of laboratory. I’ve marked down its alleged location on my map.” Vance showed Cassandra the map, pointing at the lab’s location. “I was wondering if you knew anything about it.” She replies “Hmm.. I might know something about it. But you have to take me with you if you want to learn anything more from me.” She grinned, using this as leverage just to go with him. “Well alright. I could probably use some backup anyway.” He shrugs as he replies and heads towards the door, stepping one leg over the shattered glass. They walked in the direction that Vance had marked on his map. They didn’t speak at all on the way there, mainly to keep silent, but Vance could feel that she had her eyes on him the entire time. She walked behind him, too, so there’s no way for Vance to know, without looking himself, what she was doing behind him, or what she was looking at. They made it to a tall building that looked like it might be an office building of some sort. The outer framework was almost entirely heavy steel, and the windows were reinforced glass. They got inside rather easily. There was a front desk as expected, a long hallway with big wooden doors on both sides lining the hall, each door appearing to be reinforced with an electronic locking system. At the end of the hall there were two large elevators. One had its doors slightly ajar, with no elevator in it because the elevator itself was up some number of floors. It appeared there was no power to the two elevators. While Vance was examining the inside of the elevator shaft, Cass called out to him, having apparently wandered off a little, she shouted, “Vance, I found some stairs. Come here.” He soon joined her at a stairway going down into the basement, and using his handgun flashlight to light the way down, they descended into the basement. At the bottom it appeared to be some sort of storage and computer server area. There were electric machines all over, boxes here and there, and a circuit breaker near a keypad-locked door on the right. The room was L shaped, at least from what Vance could see from here, and he couldn’t see behind the corner down the rest of the room. A light humming noise came from this room, so obviously there was still power in the building. The humming noise got louder behind the door, and sounded like a rather large generator. Vance tried punching in some keys to the keypad but nothing seemed to work. There was a slot on the side of the keyboard, to which Vance could only assume the lock required both a number and a key card. Cassandra opened the Circuit Breaker, but noted that there seemed to be no power getting to the switches. Pulling the final switch at the bottom of the circuit breaker, an electric ‘click’ sound was heard, and emergency lights in the room turned on, illuminating the room. Vance clicked off his flashlight and holstered his handgun. They both started moving around the servers and soon saw another elevator with extra wide doors at the far end. This was probably for moving large packages. Vance got to the elevator and noted that there was no power for the switch here either. “This is strange.” He started saying, “The numbers at the top of the elevator.. it only has two numbers. 00 on the left side and 40 on the right. It’s as if this elevator only goes to the top floor or something.” He thought a moment and continued, “If we can just get the power to this elevator running again...” Just then Cassandra cut him off. “I’m sorry Vance but this is as far as you go.” Vance heard a click sound behind him. Turning his head, he saw Cassandra holding onto a TMP in her right hand, pointing it at Vance. He was quiet a moment, and then replied sounding sarcastic, “I was beginning to wonder when you were going to turn on me.” She quickly replied, almost seeming a bit upset by what she was doing. “I didn’t want it to come to this but you’ve left me no choice. Just.. drop your weapons and come over here, slowly.” “Alright..” He said, taking his AK5 off his back and holding it out to the side with his right hand. “I’m going to toss it over there.” “Ok. Just don’t do anything.. that’ll make me do something I’m going to regret.” The way she was talking it seemed like she didn’t like having to do this, but as if she really had to. Vance tossed his AK5 to the side. It landed behind a server on his right, only visible to him in his peripheral vision to him. He then took out his USP and tossed it over there too. “Good, now.. come here, slowly. I promise I won’t hurt you if you just do what I say.” He drew his combat knife with his right hand, hiding it in front of him from her view. He began to turn around to walk towards her, and quickly twisted around and threw the combat knife. It got a direct hit on her TMP, knocking it back enough to surprise her and give him time to dive behind the server nearest to him. She ducked behind a crate near the back left corner behind her, and drew her second TMP. Vance picked up his two guns, slinging the AK5 behind his back and holding his USP in his hand. He peered carefully around the corner of the server and then moved back quickly as bullets from her TMPs shot at the server behind him. “You were always fast, Vance. But I’ve always been better!” She shouted. Vance could hear her quickly stepping over to the other side, placing her back against another server at the opposite end of the room. Vance attempted to duck and dash over to a similar crate on the same wall that she was on before. More bullets fly towards him making some holes in the crate, but none hitting him. Vance had to be fast if he was going to get a good shot on her. She would persist at quickly stepping out from her hiding spot and shooting at his direction, giving him the chance to time her shots. And just as she stopped shooting and was moving back behind that server, almost as if time itself had slowed down, Vance leapt over the crate and shot her in both arms, just below the shoulder. This left her barely able to carry two guns at once, since controlling them while shooting requires those muscles that were now wounded. Cassandra shrieked in pain at being shot in both arms, two spots that were more vulnerable than the rest of her body (other than her face). “Give it up, Cass. I’ll let you live if you come peacefully.” She sighed and dropped her TMPs on the ground. “Ok.. Fine. I give.” Yeah right, as if Vance is that gullible. She carefully and slowly pulled her M4S from her back with her left arm, unseen by Vance, and held it with both hands. While her arms were hurt, she was able to hold that gun more or less stably. “I’m coming over there” Vance said, as he started walking towards her. “Ya know, I always thought you were an expert marksman and fighter, Vance...” she said as he was slowly moving towards her. She breathed in heavily to prepare herself. “But you can’t be the best if you’re dead!” She shouted as she leapt from her spot, shooting at Vance with her M4S. He predicted this, however, and ducked out of the way, shooting four more times at her, each bullet landing right in her chest. One of her shots, however, grazed his upper right leg. She fell to the ground, landing on her right arm, and cried out in pain. Vance stood up carefully, and limped over to her, holding his gun out to her in case she tries anything. He looks down at her with pity as she’s bleeding out. She starts to laugh, “Haha! Good shot there, Vance. Yet I’m still alive. *cough* And here you are, standing above me with the advantage.. You probably don’t have it in you to kill me. Come on! Finish me off, Vance!” He ignored her taunts, and lifted his gun back, showing he wasn’t going to shoot her. He started to turn to leave, “Oh Vance..” she says behind him. “Catch!” She throws the combat knife he threw at her earlier. She fumbles, though, since she’s very badly wounded, any action becomes a fumble. Vance dodges the dagger flying right for his upper chest, and shoots her in the head. He then goes to pick up his combat knife, and sheaths both it and his handgun. He looks back at her as he leaves, wondering more about his past with her. Wondering just how much of what she said was true, and what was a lie. The only thing he felt was undeniably truth was her mention of her “always knowing he was an expert marksman.” That statement, whether entirely true or simply boasting, shows one thing: Whatever he used to do when he was last around her, it involved being a good shot with a gun, and probably involved killing. Somehow he doubted he was either in the army or the police force. But he felt it had to have been some kind of military. Who he worked for, and what they had him doing, remained a mystery to Vance. Vance headed on home to tend to his wounds. By this time the sun had already begun to rise. Vance ate an early breakfast, as much as he could scarf down, and immediately locked up and went to sleep. Category:Blog posts